Phishing goes mobile

I think everyone's gotten an email about how your bank account has been closed or how your PayPal account has been hacked or how your eBay account has had unauthorized usage.  We've been taught not to follow those links in our emails or provide any essential information because it's probably a hoax, and you would have been duped into giving scam artists all the information they need to bleed your bank account dry.

Well, today I get a phone call on my cell phone from a phone number that registers as 49 on the caller ID (how does anyone get around caller ID these days?).  I answer the phone, and get an automated message saying that my debit card has been inactivated and that I should push 1 to get it reactivated.  Uh...this is new.  I hesitate, unwilling to push 1, but thinking that the message might repeat.  Then I think, "of course it's not going to repeat, the recording sounded like it was pirated from maybe 10 other recorded messages and pasted together.  They were lucky to get it in English."  Of course, it also occurs to me that there's little I can do about a call without caller ID or anything else to pass on to the police.

So, I call my bank to see what they know about this.  "All of our agents are currently busy.  The wait is currently more than 10 minutes.  Please wait and your call will be answered in the order in which it was received."  *boring music*  Waitwaitwait.  *boring music*

Well, crap, I'll look online.  I can do that while I listen to boring music.  Sure enough, this very phone call has been reported to various credit unions.  But not a single hit anywhere near the top of the Google search from a big bank.  I bank at a big bank.  Surely this can't be only a small bank issue.  Or maybe only the small banks (and the Better Business Bureau) care enough to put something online.  *hang up on big bank's boring music*

Or maybe individuals are actually targeted by their phone numbers and the scam artists have moved on to larger bank customers.  I certainly hope this call was random and not that Verizon's sold my phone number or some sales clerk slaving away at some thankless retail job isn't collecting phone numbers...  I must remember to be nice next time I shop at Macy's.

Moral of the story, NEVER blindly follow instructions from an unsolicited communication regarding your finances, regardless of how you were contacted.  And if you do press 1, for God's sake, don't give them your account or Social Security number!  Oh, and maybe it's time to switch to a small bank.